Friday, January 25, 2013

The main thing that I don’t miss about an English Winter is not
so much the weather, but actually the long nights.I can take the cold and I actually like snow
(as long as it’s fresh and not slushy), but the extended periods of darkness can just be plain
depressing.

The problem is that if the daytimes are overcast in England,
you can actually spend a week or more when it never seems to get light.You get up in darkness, go to work in
darkness, spend the day indoors looking out at the greyness and then return
home in the dark.The experience of
being stuck inside can also be exaggerated by an element of claustrophobia in
many cases, given that the size of rooms and houses are generally more modest
in England, compared with the USA.

I have long speculated that the darkness contributes to the
melancholic streak in the English character.Just as the US is 2 notches to the right on the political scale, Blighty
is 2 notches towards miserableness on the chirpiness meter.

Not everyone in the US lives in Florida, of course.Some of the northern states have winters much
harsher than Northern England, or even Highland Scotland, for that matter.Some US Northerners, nicknamed ‘Snowbirds’
travel down to Florida for the Winter months in order to avoid the worst of it.

December in St Augustine, Florida

I do miss having four distinct seasons, though.In Florida it is (almost too) hot and humid
from May to September; sunny and comfortable for Spring (March to April) and Autumn
(October to November); with the Winter months being more like October in the UK:
cold, but only occasionally freezing.Actually, that’s not true, the Florida nights can be cold, but the
daytimes are often sunnier and warmer than a typical Summer’s day in England.

Ironically, because the Winter can be so dark and miserable
in England, Spring can be a truly joyous time - when, much to everyone’s
relief, Nature literally seems to ‘spring’ back to life after lying dormant for
what seems like an age.You don’t get
that in Florida.It just gets gradually
hotter (and stickier) from February onwards.

Snow in Headingley, Leeds

I am certainly not moaning.I can play tennis here all year round here, which is pretty
amazing.The Winter in Florida, if anything, can be
better for outdoor sports.I still
remember the singles match I played at the height of Summer, when it was over a
100 degrees F and even the spectators in the shade were dripping with
perspiration – it was more like a war of attrition than a sporting contest!

It is also true to say that human cultures always tend to
adapt to their situation and make the most of it.The ‘indoor culture’ in England has no doubt
contributed to its wealth of literature, music, and numerous hobbies and
pastimes.There is also no real equivalent
in Florida of stumbling up a snow covered hill, entering a pub with a real
fire, and supping a foamy pint of warm ale whilst you thaw out.

Monday, January 14, 2013

I have written about this topic before, but I was
inspired to explore it further after stumbling upon a fascinating Stephen
Fry video recently (more on that later!).Humour really is a fascinating area - what people find funny really does
give an insight into their philosophy, culture, and general world outlook.

Some of the feedback that I got previously was that some
Americans felt I was a little harsh in my previous writings, where I said that
Americans were generally more serious and that a lot of British humour gets
lost in translation in the US, particularlyirony.

I will try to explain these two points a little more, but
first I think it’s worth pointing out that I suspect the average American maybe
underestimates how many differences there are, when it comes to British and
American humor.Yes, there are large
areas of overlap, but also major differences.Okay, you may have seen Monty Python and Mr Bean, but humour operates
differently in all sorts of ways in the UK that don’t generally reach or work
on this side of the Atlantic.

Reverence

One major difference that I remember the US writer, Bill
Bryson pointing out in his book: I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away, is that humour generally is far more
revered in the UK than in the USA.Bryson
cites the classic (and rather great) John Cleese quote that: “An Englishman
would rather be told he’s a bad lover than he has no sense of humour”.

You can actually get away with almost anything in the UK, as
long as it is presented as humour.You
can insult the queen, your employer, religion, the army, whatever, as long as
you do it right and make some people laugh.Even if someone were mildy offended they wouldn’t generally protest,
they tend to be more worried about appearing to have no sense of humour, which,
as Cleese says, is a major taboo in the UK.America, with its diverse population, devout religious communities, and occasionally rigid political correctness, can sometimes seem very sensitive from a British
perspective.

A portion of British humour might be also labelled as “smart”
in the US, where although some people might find it funny, you can also get
into trouble for it more easily than you would in the UK.

Of course, it's also true to say that British irony can also very easily devolve into cynicism and sarcasm too, which are less appealing sides of the English psyche.

Americans are more
serious?

Generally
speaking, the American philosophy and approach to life is very different in certain respects.Americans are generally optimistic:
life is an opportunity for success and it has real meaning and there are always
avenues of improvement open.The British
philosophy tends to be much more downbeat: yes, life can be good, but often it
can be an ordeal, tinged with absurdity, and sometimes you just have to just grin
and bear it.

Mark Twain

What gets lost?

What Bill Bryson describes as “verbal sleights of hand” are just
far less common in the US.Wordplay,
double entendre, and yes, irony, are far rarer here and the average American often just
doesn’t expect such trickery to occur in general conversation and so it goes straight past them.(When I was first living here, I had the
opposite problem, I tended to over-analyse things that Americans said, when
almost always, they were being completely literal.)

That doesn’t mean that I am saying that all Americans don’t
get irony, by the way, it is more a question of degree.Obviously, there have been many great American
humorists, such as Mark Twain, who were masters of ironic humour and there were
thousands of Americanswho bought his
books and found them funny.

The humour differences can make things difficult sometimes
though, if you are a British expat.We Brits
don’t do overt shows of emotion much, so when our ability to communicate
through language and humour are limited, it can feel a little stifling
sometimes.

Stephen Fry

Anyway, back to the excellent Stephen Fry video that I
mentioned at the start.In it, Fry
explores another aspect of British and American humor that differs
considerably.

Essentially, the British comic hero tends to be a
loser.He or she has high aspirations (and
may also be pompous, or pretentious), but he/she is constantly failing to pull
him or herself out of the hole.

The American comic hero, on the other hand, tends to be a success
- he or she is a wisecracker, throwing out clever quips at the expense of the
idiots that surround him or her.